


Rattlesnake Oil

by T Verano (t_verano)



Category: The Sentinel (TV)
Genre: Angst, Breathplay, Episode-related: SenToo, Kink, M/M, multifandomkinkmeme on dreamwidth, nobody dies though, this is not a pretty fix-it fic; okay?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-27
Updated: 2011-06-27
Packaged: 2020-03-17 12:59:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18965725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/t_verano/pseuds/T%20Verano
Summary: After the fountain, Blair explores breathplay as a way to heal. Jim gets dragged along with him.





	Rattlesnake Oil

**Author's Note:**

> Written for carodee's glorious prompt on the dreamwidth multifandom kink meme: "It’s Blair’s way of coping with the trauma of his drowning. Jim cooperates because the moment Blair takes in that first panicked gasp of air reminds him of the intense joy he felt when he knew Blair was alive."
> 
> I veered away from the last bit of the prompt. You know, a lot....
> 
> (Originally on the kinkmeme I posted this with a crummy temporary title, since I knew in my bones the fic was supposed to be called Snake Oil, but no way could I call it that, what with Martha's fabulous story by that name. So. Hopefully the title I've used here doesn't tread on the real Snake Oil's toes... If anybody reading this thinks it does, please let me know! I do *not* want to do that!)

For once Jim gets home early. The Volvo's outside, so Sandburg's home early too. Maybe he'll be up for going over to Ronnie's; shoot some pool, hit the taco bar, kill a pitcher or two of draft. 

Maybe that'll make things better between them.

Be nice if something would.

God _damn_ Alex. Jim pauses in the hallway, key in his hand, and sighs. The loft isn't exactly a war zone, but it's not what it used to be.

Nothing's what it used to be. Not even sex. It used to be easy, as easy between them as shooting some hoops, arguing about the pizza order, running down each other's choice of dating material. But the first time Jim made a move on Blair after they got back from Mexico, a grope and nuzzle that should've guaranteed them both some satisfying and friendly action, Blair slid away from him like an ice cube slides away from a hot burner. Said, in a voice that sounded like it had a dozen different emotions mixed up in it —and not one of them anything Jim was interested in dealing with — "Not tonight, Jim, okay?" 

Meaning not any night, as it's turned out. Or evening. Or afternoon or morning. No more fucking away an hour or two, or the occasional entire lazy night, in Jim's bed. No more casual blow-jobs on the couch or hand-jobs in the elevator. No more anything. Blair even seems to find it hard to smile at Jim like he really means it these days.

That hurts more than it ought to.

And it isn't fucking fair. It wasn't Jim's fault, what happened. Any of it. Which is a direct proclamation from Sandburg, and if Sandburg doesn't actually mean it, he fucking shouldn't say it.

Not that Jim believes him anyway. 

_Face down in that goddamned fountain. Not breathing._ Not breathing.

_— you let him die —_

Pain. _Pain._ What the… 

Jim stares at his hand, which feels like it's being worked over with a steak knife. It isn't, of course. It's just the edges of the key digging into his fingers. Sharp edges, hard and unyielding. 

Like the truth.

This isn't getting him anywhere. Jim closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Sighs it out, and concentrates. His hand is fine. And all he's going to think about right now is Ronnie's, grabbing Sandburg and heading to Ronnie's; nothing else. Pitcher of draft, a game of eight-ball… Out of habit he focuses his hearing inside the loft, scouting things out before he puts the key into the lock. Once — or three or four times — bitten, twice —

_Oh, Christ — Blair —_

Jim's inside the loft and in front of Sandburg's room, fast. And silent; his weapon drawn and his nerves at ice-calm combat readiness, assessing, listening. Listening to Blair's heart trying to pound its way out of his chest, his struggling gasps for air: some son of a bitch is choking Blair out. Some son of a —

Son of a —

— a fucking _ghost_ is choking Blair out? There's no other heartbeat, no other scent, just Blair's. 

Just Blair's fear, Blair's —

Arousal? Goddamn it. Blair's arousal.

Jim's through the doors and into Blair's room. And goddamn it all to everlasting hell, Blair's propped up against his headboard, choking for air —

Choking himself. He has his own goddamned hand wrapped tight around his own goddamned throat.

_Not for fucking long he hasn't._

"What the goddamned hell do you think you're doing?" Jim says in a snarl that he can barely understand himself. He's breathing almost as hard as Blair is. Now.

Blair, who's gulping in air and staring at Jim almost like it was Jim's hand that was wrapped around his throat a moment ago.

 _Christ._ But whatever Blair's problem is, Jim has a more immediate one of his own. He's trying like fuck not to grab Blair by his shoulders and drag him off the bed, slam him up against the wall so hard he leaves a dent in the brick, and fucking shake some sense into him. It takes longer than it ought to for him to regain enough control to let go of Blair's wrist and step back, away from the bed, listening to the harsh — _lifesaving_ — sound of breathing, Blair's ragged breathing filling the room.

"Fuck," he says to Blair after another minute that stretches out as raggedly as Blair's breaths. " _Fuck._ Sandburg. You want to explain that?" Jim knows there's not an inch of give in his voice as he says that, and that's fine with him.

"I was…trying something," Blair says eventually. The marks from his fingers are clear to Jim, marring his throat. The expression on his face is less clear, and he sounds wary.

"Trying what? To kill off a few million brain cells?"

"No, of course not." Blair grimaces. "I'm facing my fears, Jim. I'm trying to heal."

Heal what? Jim thinks, Heal fucking _what?_ But what he says is, "Great way to heal there, Einstein — Oops, I pressed a little too hard, now I'm permanently healed right into my cemetery plot. Terrific idea, Chief."

Blair glowers at him. "It's not rocket science, Jim. Actually, it's a sexual kink quite a number of people get off on: auto-erotic —"

"Idiocy, I fucking know that," Jim says. "You were getting off on it too, don't try to tell me you weren't." Blair isn't getting off on it any longer, at least. The boner Blair's sweatpants hadn't been doing that much to conceal when Jim burst into his room has long since subsided.

Blair looks defiant and abashed at the same time. "Yeah, well. Panic attacks, hyperventilating — I know what that feels like. I should've expected I might… But that's not the point, anyway."

"It isn't," Jim says, without inflection. Sex is always the point with Blair. Almost always the point.

Used to be almost always the point.

"No!" Blair swallows, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat — his fucking throat, choking his own fucking _throat_ — and looks away for a moment before he looks back at Jim. Says, sounding tired, "I'm walking up to the lion, man. And walking away this time." Jim stares at him, knowing that he doesn't want to understand this; this is something he really doesn't _want_ to — and Blair makes an airy gesture that somehow isn't airy at all. "Lion, fountain —"

"Jesus Christ," Jim says hollowly. No, he doesn't want to understand this. 

No.

"Maybe I'm trying to rewrite history, you know?" Blair says. "I can't breathe, then I _can_ breathe — rewrite it, work through my issues, right? I think it can help, Jim."

No.

Fucking _no._ "You're kidding me," Jim says. 

Blair's expression closes up.

"Are you planning on doing this again?" Jim asks. 

Blair doesn't answer. Shaking some sense into him is beginning to seem less like a bad idea and more like Jim's only sane course of action. 

"You are, aren't you? Goddammit, Sandburg —"

"Forget it, Jim," Blair interrupts. "It's none of your business whether I do it again or not. It's not like you're going to help me out with it."

Fat fucking chance in hell of that. "Good call," Jim says, and he somehow manages to make that come out sounding dry, not desperate. 

"Right. That's what I thought." Blair looks angry and defeated and unsurprised, all at once. He jerks his head toward the doorway. "I'd like some privacy here. You mind?"

Mind? He's going to keep doing this, keep not fucking _breathing._ And he asks if Jim minds?

_— you let him die —_

It won't be face down in the fountain this time. This time it'll be In his bed. Something will go wrong; Jim will come home and Blair will be lying in his bed, not fucking breathing — not fucking breathing _permanently_ — and this time Jim won't get him back.

_— again —_

No. _Fat fucking chance in hell my ass,_ Jim thinks. Just like Sandburg to zero in on any stand Jim tries to take and make it untenable one way or another. Jim feels his jaw clench. "Yeah, I do mind. You know this is too goddamned dangerous for you to fuck with alone," he says. He forces himself to go on. "If I agree to do this incredibly idiotic shit with you, you promise me to not screw around with it any on your own? "

Blair looks at him. It's not an encouraging look. "Gee, Jim. Let me see. Breathplay with a partner who's bitching and moaning and lecturing me about what an idiot I am for wanting it, or flying peacefully solo without any —"

 _You bastard,_ Jim thinks. He misses the days when Blair made things easy for him, when Blair worked with what Jim had to offer. Complained about it a lot, yeah, but didn't throw Jim into the flames. Never threw Jim into the flames. "I won't lecture," he says, trying to cut Blair short.

"You'll just bitch and moan." Blair's holding his head high, still defiant, still not very encouraging, but there's an echo of something Jim hasn't heard for a while in his voice.

Jim's jaw unclenches a little. "Count on it," he says, and tries for a smile. "I haven't entirely stopped bitching about that strawberry-flavored lube you like, have I? But we still use it anyway." Or used to use it. Before. When they were still doing things like that. When they were still doing a lot of things they haven't been doing lately.

"That's true," Blair says. And he smiles back at Jim. Almost smiles back at Jim, at least. 

It's a start.

===========================

 

They don't go to Ronnie's. They do go upstairs together, after a dinner of something blatantly and tastelessly vegetarian that Blair hauls out of the freezer and sticks in the microwave. After Blair watches some lame-ass documentary and Jim watches a John Wayne movie and they both watch the news. After Jim's done all the housework he can manage to justify to himself at 11:30 at night and checked the locks on all the doors and windows twice, and Blair's accusingly patient immobility on the couch begins to get to him more than he can handle.

Blair strips half his clothes off on his way up the stairs and climbs into Jim's bed naked and half hard. What that means — what any of this means — Jim doesn't want to think about.

Jim gets into bed himself, with a lot more reluctance than Blair obviously has, and he's barely got his pillow arranged underneath his head when Blair clears his throat. "So how do you want to do this?" Blair says, like it's just some ordinary conversation; a couple of buddies shooting a little bull. "I mean, I was using a chokehold, since I figured my grip would automatically loosen when —"

"You 'figured'." _Bull_ is right. "You realize how dangerously head-up-your-ass _stupid_ —"

"Watch it, man," Blair says sharply.

"Just bitching," Jim says. Maybe it comes out a little snide, but so what? Blair doesn't get a free rein here, not an entirely free rein, anyway. This wasn't Jim's idea.

Blair gives Jim a glare, but he goes on talking after a moment. Unfortunately. "Okay. We got choking. Suffocating — different methods: a pillow, your hand over my nose and mouth. Saran Wrap. I don't know about that one, though. It's too…clingy. Hard to get off, maybe. Plastic wrap's not good for the environment anyway, right?" He pauses. "Other ways … Uh…" His voice trails off.

It makes Jim suddenly and unforgivingly furious. Blair can't even say it. He wants to do this — this fucking insane reenactment of what happened, of being _dead_ — and he can't even bring himself to say it. "Yeah, other ways," Jim answers. He knows his voice sounds cold and he doesn't care. "You could go fill up the bathtub and heal yourself with a little auto-erotic drowning, Chief; you think about doing it _that_ way?"

Silence. Except for the sound of Blair breathing, of his heart beating, too fast.

"Fuck you," Blair says finally and rolls out of bed and goes downstairs.

Jim listens but Blair doesn't go to the bathroom and fill up the tub. Doesn't even go to the kitchen and get a glass of water. He goes to bed.

And breathes. All night.

Jim listens to make sure.

===========================

They don't go to Ronnie's the next night either.

Blair throws Jim a bone. It's almost like the pre-Sierra Verde Blair, Jim thinks, and even though it's a bone Jim wants shit all to do with, it's either that or spend every night listening to Blair breathe.

Every night? Every minute of every fucking day listening to him — quit being a cop so he can follow Blair around like a stalker, listening to him breathe.

So when Blair stands up after the 11 o'clock news is over and sends a glance upstairs towards Jim's bed, then says, with razor-edged determination, "You get that your bitching license is revoked, right? History. Flat-lined. If you're doing this with me, you're doing it _with_ me, or I do it alone," Jim grabs the bone. 

He doesn't have to be happy about it, however. "Yeah, I get that," he answers. "Fuck, Sandburg. You really think this is going to…" He stops at the look on Blair's face. "Yeah, all right. I wish you would just see a goddamn shrink instead, though."

Blair snorts. "The shrink wouldn't tell me not to do it, Jim. Try to make me understand my motives, sure, but I already understand those. Aside from that, shrinks think it's healthy to identify and explore your sexual kinks."

"This isn't a kink," Jim protests. He doesn't want it to be a kink. A kink would get pleasure out of… of what happened. A kink would _last._ "This isn't a kink," he repeats, "this is…" Except he has no idea what it is.

He knows what he wants it to be. Temporary. Very fucking temporary. One-shot miracle cure. Snake oil that actually fucking works.

"A kink." Blair shrugs. He doesn't look worried, not about maybe liking it, about maybe wanting to keep doing it, about anything. "Could be. I don't know yet."

They go upstairs. This time Blair waits to pull his clothes off till he's standing beside the bed. He looks at Jim, who hasn't made it past his shorts yet — and doesn't plan to; this isn't about sex, not for him, anyway — and seems to fold in on himself a little.

"We could do it standing up," Jim says. Which is a little nasty of him, he knows that. "That way I know for sure when to stop, when you pass out and your ass hits the floor."

That doesn't make Blair bail out on him again, like Jim's half hoping it will — turning in his badge and shadowing Sandburg twenty-four seven wouldn't be so bad, considering — but it does put some starch back in Blair's spine. "Yeah, Jim. It's not like it'd be obvious to you otherwise or anything," he says. "Asshole." He sits down on the bed. 

Then he lies down. 

It's going to happen. It's fucking going to happen. _Now._

This isn't fair, Jim thinks as he gets into bed beside Blair. Maybe Blair's been shitting him all along, leading him down the garden path: he knows damn well it was all Jim's fault, he has to know that, and this is his goddamned revenge.

"So," Blair says after Jim lies down. He doesn't sound quite as pissy now that he's getting his way. "I'm kind of more in favor of the your hand over my mouth and nose option myself, but I'm open to suggestions here."

Except he's not open. He hasn't been open — about anything — since Mexico. Not with Jim, anyway. 

Damn it.

"Jim," Blair says, impatiently.

Jim closes his eyes. Gives himself a minute. "No chokeholds," he says eventually. He doesn't explain; he tries to not remember the way cartilage feels beneath your fingers as it caves in under pressure. Tries not to remember the sounds the enemy — a person — a dead man who hasn't realized he's dead yet — makes, trying to breathe through a ruined trachea. 

A cautious touch brushes his arm, and Jim's pulse jumps. This is what he's lost. Or thrown away; the touch burns even as it comforts. He moves, casually, so Blair's hand can drop away just as casually, and clears his throat. Do or die, he thinks. _Or maybe both._ He's glad he didn't eat much of anything for dinner. "No chokeholds," he repeats, and makes sure that his voice sounds better this time. "So I guess we try my hand covering your mouth." _Do or die._

"Good," Blair says. "That's great. That's —"

Jim's hand is over Blair's mouth, covering it. Covering his nose. Clamping down without quarter. Blair's eyes are huge, shocked — _frightened_ — and his hands grab Jim's wrist, trying to pull Jim's hand away.

 _Fighting._

That's not the way this is going to go. 

Jim knows how to do this, after all. He rolls on top of Blair and uses the weight of his body to hold Blair in place, arms and legs and torso; locks his muscles and keeps Blair's frantic tugs from budging his hand even the breadth of a single wisp of air. 

After a few — endless — moments, Blair stops struggling so hard and starts to give himself over to what he said he wanted in the first place. Jim watches it happen as well as feels it, watches Blair's eyes — still huge, still locked on Jim's eyes — shift from panic to acceptance, to something else Jim isn't sure he wants to try to interpret. He murmurs, "You didn't get time to prepare for it before, did you?" and Blair shakes his head, a tiny movement that Jim's hand allows, rides with.

Blair's lips are slightly open. His breath — the breath he has left, the air he has left — is hot against Jim's palm. 

Heat. Moving air, if stale air now, as Blair's body — with or without his mind's cooperation — tries to suck new, life-giving air past the impermeable barrier of Jim's hand. 

_Not going to happen._

Jim can feel himself getting hard. The press of their bodies together, adrenaline, fear? Anger? He doesn't care.

Blair's getting hard beneath him. Oxygen deprivation. Adrenaline. Kink. Whatever.

Jim doesn't care.

The sucking drag against Jim's palm grows more insistent again as Blair's body makes one last-ditch effort at life. The hand Blair raises in a reflex of self-preservation fumbles for Jim's hand and doesn't quite make it. 

The hot oxygen-empty air under Jim's palm moves less and less. 

Blair's eyes lose their lock on Jim's face. Lose their focus. 

Roll back. 

His eyelids close.

Jim lowers his head, his lips next to Blair's ear. "You never fucking die on me again, Chief, you hear me?" he whispers. _Even if I screw up again and let you._

Blair's limp beneath him. Gone. 

Now. _Now._ Jim lifts his hand.

Blair doesn't breathe.

Blair doesn't breathe…

He doesn't breathe. Oh, God, no. _He fucking doesn't —_

__

__

Breathe.

One whooping gasp. Then another. Gulping air. Eyes dazed and panicked again, but they find Jim's eyes and lock on. 

_This is the truth,_ Jim thinks hopelessly, _this is what happened._ None of that goddamned mystical shit, none of Blair's fucking 'mysterious'. No crossbow. No water.

No Alex.

No excuses.

He watches something that looks terrifyingly like trust — trust he hasn't seen since… since _before_ — flicker in the blue-black depths of Blair's eyes. And he isn't a praying man — what the fuck's ever been the point of praying? only Incacha has ever helped him — but he prays now, to Incacha, to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost of his childhood, to every tribal god Sandburg's ever mentioned whose names Jim doesn't even begin to remember.

Then he starts to move, grinding himself mercilessly, helplessly — greedily — against the body he's still pressed against. Watches as Blair's eyes darken even more.

This isn't over, Jim thinks, just before he stops thinking at all. _This isn't over._

_Goddamned fucking snake oil._


End file.
